


Just about There

by Polly_Phemus (orphan_account)



Series: Dom Down the Hall [6]
Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - BDSM, Brunch, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-18
Updated: 2017-06-18
Packaged: 2018-11-15 08:41:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11227368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Polly_Phemus
Summary: The countdown continues winding down, causing Jared to fret that a new countdown clock might replace the expiring one.  Misha is having none of it, but is very eager indeed to have brunch and to encourage Jared's natural optimism to shine through, very much in that order.





	Just about There

**Author's Note:**

> A reminder: it's 2017 in the story, but Jared is around twenty-five (and led a pretty sheltered life), Jensen is twenty-nine and no one is sure about Misha.

Despite the four-hour nap that had broken up Jared's busy Friday, Jared, having fallen asleep at half-past three Saturday morning, woke up to find he'd gotten in a solid seven hours. He rolled around in his bed, noting that his ass was holding steady at Serrano, or in not-chili-pepper terms, not that bad at all, while also taking delight in knowing that he only had three hours to go.

He didn't quite bound out of bed, but he was pretty cheerful as he showered, brushed his teeth and emerged into the living room. Misha was sound asleep on the pile of pillows in front of Jared's wall of windows, one hand curled protectively around "Betty Pledges to...." Jared wondered how far he'd gotten with it.

He and Misha had walked the dogs one last time somewhere around one a.m., but they were clearly ready to go out again. Even Zucchini had an eager look as Jared scooped up his keys and called them to heel. He leashed them, blushing as he thought about what he'd fantasized the night before. Dogs were dogs and people were people, but he still couldn't stop himself from thinking about Jensen leading Jared around in front of all kinds of well-dressed, approving doms. 

While he was outside, waiting for Cardy and Zucchini to attend to their own matters, he tried to analyze his fantasy in the cold light of day. He supposed he should be ashamed of himself or embarrassed or worried that he was turning into exactly the kind of sub he'd never wanted to be, but Jared couldn't quite get any part of his brain to shame himself for having found some new kinks.

It wasn't like he wanted Jensen to just walk him down the street, naked and leashed. He wasn't even sure if he wanted to act out his fantasy of being at a swanky party, naked and leashed. He sure liked the fantasy, though, and if Jensen wanted it....

Well, that was where things started to get problematic, Jared thought. If Jensen wanted it because he wanted to display Jared like his property, bought and paid for, that was not at all something Jared was on board with. But if Jensen wanted it because he thought it would be hot and because Jared thought it would be hot and they both knew it was just for that, that would be okay. Great, even.

"You don't even know if any of that is a thing he's remotely into," Jared reminded himself out loud. He didn't know any of the things Jensen was into sexually, no matter how many fevered imaginings Jared's brain wanted to suggest as possibilities. He knew that, non-sexually, Jensen was into high rise views, food, particularly appetizers, craft beers, "Wonder Sub," and treating Jared with respect. 

Which was a hell of a lot more than he'd known about Jensen at the start of the week. Then he'd known his last name, first initial, apartment number and that J. Ackles, 12G, always looked vaguely pleased and approving when he saw Jared with his dogs.

"Stop getting ahead of yourself, Padalecki," Jared warned himself as he gathered the dogs and took them inside.

Misha had woken up while Jared had walked the dogs and even brewed coffee.

"Eggs Florentine?" Jared asked.

"Are you sure you're a nutritionist?" Misha squinted at Jared. "And yes, please and thank you."

"I serve it with spinach instead of Canadian bacon, not in addition to," Jared said defensively as he started gathering ingredients.

"How's the ass?"

"Holding steady," Jared reported. "Slept on my back and everything."

"And the countdown?"

"Two and a half hours," Jared said without even looking at the stove clock.

"Nice," Misha said as he poured coffee for both of them.

"Two and a half hours until the next countdown starts," Jared amended. 

"Another one?"

"Yeah. I've been assuming that he'll just beat a path to my door come one thirty, but maybe not. Maybe it isn't as big a deal to him as it is to me."

"Oh, come on," Misha protested. "Even if he's not totally pining over you, which according to your own account, Ms. Harris and Osric pretty much said he was, he's gotta be concerned on a professional level."

"There is that," Jared admitted as he whisked. "Especially since he doesn't usually do this sort of thing; he'll at least want to know he did it right."

"There's your optimism!" Misha exclaimed triumphantly. "I knew it couldn't have gone too far. Now let it out even more!" Misha made an expansive gesture, presumable directed at Jared's optimism, made all the more spectacular by the handful of spinach Misha was clutching.

"He went to considerable trouble and effort to help me out." Jared ducked under the spinach Misha was still waving around so he could move his sauce away from the stove. "And talked Ms. Harris into it as well. That's not just being neighborly." Jared started adding clarified butter from his ready-made supply. "Just being neighborly would've been referring me to the most trustworthy service he could think of that was economical or offered decent financing."

"He's warm for your form," Misha said as he pulled English muffins from the toaster.

Jared stared at Misha. "Did you get that from 'Betty Pledges to...'?"

"Probably," Misha said. "I was really into it, and then I fell asleep and then I dreamed about all three of them and me, in an array of delightful configurations."

"Let me guess, you think Archie is a switch," Jared teased. 

"Clearly. Even you can see it, my heterodynamic friend," Misha said happily. Jared thought about that while he finished prepping brunch. He wasn't sure he'd heard the term "heterodynamic" before. He remembered that "hetero" meant "different," like David Bowie's heterochromatic eyes. So...heterodynamic must mean someone who was into people with the opposite dynamic. Which, until he'd met Misha and had his horizons expanded, Jared would've assumed everyone was. Misha was a switch, but was there something beyond that? "Same" would be "homo," like homogenized milk. So was there something called "homodynamic?" People who only wanted to have sex with people who had the same dynamic as they did? Jared's mind boggled. How would that even work?

Whatever, he thought dismissively. It was an interesting thought experiment he'd file away for later. Right now he wanted to concentrate on brunch and Misha's company. Misha'd been his overnight guest and had spent the entire time fussing over Jared and Jared hadn't even asked Misha what was going on in his life.

As they ate brunch, Misha told Jared the latest; as usual, there was a hell of a lot of it. Jared wasn't sure how Misha could keep it all sorted out in his mind, but apparently he could. There was something about a skunk getting into his house, getting itself ensnared in macrame supplies which would now all have to be either replaced or made into skunk-specific pieces, and how one of his roommates, the one who worked for a medical marijuana dispensary, had introduced him to a PhD. student in sub history, Vicki, and how she was "totally domly, totally chill" and Misha was super into her. Jared wasn't sure what the skunk had to do with it, if anything, but Misha's stories didn't exactly follow a three-act structure. Or any kind of structure at all, really. Structure was not really Misha's thing. One day, Jared was sure, Misha would keep an entire group at Atlanta Pines in Tree pose for ten minutes and spend thirty seconds on Lotus.

Although Jared had resolved not to think about Jensen while he was concentrating on catching up with Misha's doings, he couldn't stop himself from contrasting his own agonizing over Jensen and whether or not he would call and when with Misha's relaxed attitude toward Vicki. Misha clearly liked her a lot, but there was no stress there.

Without Jared having to say anything, Misha intuited what he was thinking.

"You know, I read somewhere that in Hawai'i, before European colonization, they thought that the butterflies in the stomach feeling wasn't love but anxiety," Misha said. "I have no idea if that's really how they felt, but it's worth thinking about."

Jared mulled over Misha's words while Misha changed the subject, this time to a workplace incident relating to Misha's part-time job silk-screening T-shirts. One of his best customers had a range of interests which he liked to celebrate with T-shirts, and it usually fell to Misha to design them. This time, it involved a dream about a tentacle monster and a luxury motor yacht crewed by scantily clad subs floundering in the Tyrrhenian Sea.

Jared decided that he was anxious about the situation with Jensen but not about Jensen himself. Jensen qua Jensen didn't scare Jared; the inherent possibility of disappointment and heartbreak that came with dating scared Jared. Misha didn't have Jared's hang-ups, so he was able to appreciate being attracted to Vicki and the possibility of more to come without worrying about the whole thing going down in flames.

They took the dogs for one last walk before Misha left. Jared thanked him profusely for his help; Misha waved it off casually like giving up his Friday to listen to Jared being a tweenybopper had been the perfect cap to his week. 

"The butterflies will go away," he promised Jared as he left. "And he will call."

Jared went back to his apartment and filled the tub to give the dogs a wash. He hoped Jensen was right on both counts. 

"If I'm just anxious about the uncertainty," he told Zucchini as she lolled in the tub, "then once I know what's going on, no more butterflies." Zucchini, Jared figured, approved of no more butterflies. She was a dog who didn't like surprises or changes to her routine. She also liked bathtime; she seemed almost mournful once Jared toweled her off and suggested she find a nice warm patch of sun while he and Cardy wrecked the bathroom.

Cardy liked butterflies. Jared knew this for a fact; he'd seen his dog chase enough of them. Cardy would probably tell him he was lucky to have the butterflies right in his stomach where he could find them. Butterflies, Jared decided, weren't actually inherently bad. They'd been his friends in exams and job interviews, albeit annoying friends. They always paid him back, though. He stressed about the A, he got the A. He stressed about the job, he got the job. Jared figured this was probably magical thinking. He probably would've gotten the As and the jobs without getting all nervous about them, but somewhere along the line his brain had decided that worrying was good. Worrying worked.

It was also distracting.

Jared didn't have much more time for reflection; Cardy was making more escape attempts than usual, timing his moves to coincide with times of maximum bathtime slipperiness. Cardy didn't really hate the bathtub, Jared knew, he just considered it another game, like catching the Frisbee.

Eventually Cardy was clean and wandered off to see if he could get Zucchini interested in something. Jared cleaned up the bathroom, shaking his head at the sheer number of towels that had accumulated during the process. When his parents had come to Atlanta to help him pick the right condo to invest in, his dad had really stuck to his guns in insisting that Jared get a unit with its own washer and dryer. And he'd been right; Jared mentally thanked him as he loaded towels into the washer. 

Having done that, Jared went to the kitchen to investigate the box Ms. Griffin had sent over. The "Wonder Sub" DVD set was right on top, carefully stored in a thick plastic zip-top freezer bag. It was a thing of wonder, a giant, colorful box holding three individual boxes, with Lyle Waggoner striking various poses in the iconic outfit on all the covers. Jared had to look long and hard before he finally found a small insert of Lynda Carter as Steph Trevor tucked in the corner of the back of the box for the first season; she was standing slightly behind Wonder Sub. 

"That's right, the sub's the star of the show," Jared said. He didn't really remember the show all that well, but he remembered being thrilled by Lyle Waggoner's performance in the title role and thinking that Lynda Carter was hot. He wondered what he'd think of her, or more accurately her character, now that he was an adult. He hoped that it didn't turn out that Steph was an asshole dom.

He carefully put the DVDs aside to explore the rest of the box. It was the usual assortment of prepared food, ingredients and utensils that various vendors had dropped off or sent in over the last few weeks. Ms. Griffin had a habit of just tossing everything into the box and then handing it to Jared when it was full.

Jared picked up a spatula. It seemed sturdy and useful, but no different than the ones they already used. "What is this, the new 2018 model already?" Jared asked Cardy, who was standing in the door. "Don't know that I'm ready to trade in yet." He twirled the spatula around like it was some kind of martial arts accessory. "Mind you, it does handle well. Good balance." He smacked his thigh with it. Hard.

"Oh, yeah," he said. "This has a lot of possibilities, but I'm not sure I need it for the kitchen as such.

"Hey, what's up?" he added as Zucchini joined Cardy in the door. She cocked her head at him and looked a little disapproving; it was her "my routine has been ever so slightly disturbed" look. Jared got up and followed her back into the living room.

Zucchini had moved to stand next to a piece of paper on the floor, positioned as if someone had slid it under the door. It was folded in half with Jared's name written neatly in strong black ink on the side facing up. Jared looked at the clock. It was 1:34.

Jared just stared at the piece of paper for a few moments. He'd been expecting a call or a text or maybe an e-mail if Jensen turned out to be particularly old-school. But a hand-delivered, hand-written letter? This was downright old-fashioned. And, Jared decided instantly, incredibly sweet. If he and Jensen hadn't been neighbors, maybe it would've been stalkery, like Jensen was saying "I know where you live and, by the way, your building's security is shit." But Jensen already knew where he lived. So, to Jared's way of thinking, the paper was more like physical proof that Jensen was right there, down the hall, ready to help Jared if he needed anything.

Jared savored the moment before swooping down to pick it up. He unfolded it to read:

_Dear Jared,_

_I hope you're doing well. If you need anything at all...walking the dogs, short on milk, post-proceeding anxiety, boredom, whatever...just come on over. If you read this in time and are feeling up for something to do, I've got the pool table booked for an hour starting at 6:30 (best I could do on a Saturday) and I'd love it if you'd join me.  
\--Jensen _

Jared refrained from clutching Jared's invitation to his heart. Instead, he went over to his bookshelf to find a box of nice stationery he kept on hand just in case, then settled in at his dining table to write a brief but carefully handwritten reply. 

_Dear Jensen,_

_Thank you so much for your note! And the offer of assistance. I'm doing pretty well, so no worries there. And I'll definitely see you at 6:30 for pool.  
\--Jared _

Jared was very proud of himself for not immediately rushing to throw himself on Jensen's doorstep even though he had an open invitation. But the truth was that he really didn't need any help and while he was eager to see Jensen, it had nothing whatsoever to do with Friday's proceeding and, now that Jensen had asked him out, he kind of wanted to start seeing Jensen as a date, however casual, rather than as a follow-up. It seemed like starting out as equal as sub and dom could get and a chance to get to know each other without as much weird post-punishment psychology tripping either of them up.

Jared slipped out and down to slide the letter under the door marked 12G. He did have a new countdown: slightly less than five hours until he'd see Jensen. And his butterflies were still with him, but substantially calmed and he knew he could spend the rest of the afternoon doing Saturday stuff and not be preoccupied with Jensen. Well, not completely preoccupied, anyway.


End file.
